This year's CES saw the announcement of the first third-party device "Powered by Steam OS", the Legion Go S, and if Valve has its way it certainly won't be the last. The Linux-based operating system has been in development at Valve since 2012, though what really catapulted it into peoples' hands was the success of Steam Deck.
Pierre-Loup Griffais is one of the Valve developers dedicated to SteamOS, and told French site Frandroid "we’ve come a long way behind the scenes”. He's been working on the project since its very beginnings, and says the focus at the moment is on compatibility: "All of this work is broadly applicable to the PC platform, and it’s going to continue to expand over time. Supporting multiple platforms, multiple chipsets, controllers for different machines that are out there and even ones that aren’t out yet."
Griffais acknowledges that the support on some platforms is still "very basic" but that, for example, it has four developers currently working on the NVIDIA open source driver: "It’s just that there’s a lot of work to do... But the beauty of this open source model is that a lot of the elements that we’ve put in place or that have been put in place by other players in the community are shared. A lot of work has already been done, and everyone is developing the same code base. It’s a pretty unique model.”
The flipside of this is that Valve can also take advantage of some open source elements itself: "We're not too interested in inventing our own sauce," says Griffais. "If something is already done and meets our standards of performance and functionality, we use it."
Valve's goal with the OS is to have it compatible with traditional PCs, laptops, portable consoles and any other formats. The open nature of it inevitably brings to mind Windows, the world's most popular operating system and a closed one: Gabe Newell once infamously described Windows 8 as a "catastrophe" for the PC ecosystem. But Griffais says they're not out to pick a fight with Redmond.
"I don't think the goal is to have a certain market share, or to push users away from Windows," says Griffais. "If a user has a good experience on Windows, there's no problem. I think it's interesting to develop a system that has different goals and priorities, and if it becomes a good alternative for a typical desktop user, that's great. It gives them choice. But it's not a goal in itself to convert users who already have a good experience."
Griffais says there's "not really" a roadmap for SteamOS's future, and comes out with one of those Valve lines: "It's when we have the time and we get there."
Following the success of Steam Deck, is there any chance we might see a comeback for Steam Machines? "Right now, we're focused on handhelds," says Griffais. "But as our work expands our ability to work on other platforms and have a good experience in different form factors... We've already done a lot to make these consoles connectable to screens, connectable to a controller… We're not there yet to give priority to a Steam Machine. But in collaboration or internally, it's an open door to the future."
It's easy to understate what an unusual project SteamOS is. It represents over a dozen years of work from some of the industry's finest, is funded by a private company, yet is open source and free for everyone to use. "I'm pretty happy that we've managed to find a balance that's beneficial to everyone, while still being able to help this PC ecosystem in this way," says Griffais. "I'm really happy about that."
